January 8, 2015

In the waning hours of the 113th Congress, the U.S. Senate
passed H.R.5771, the Tax Increase Prevention Act of 2014, a bill previously
approved by the House of Representatives on Dec. 3. At press time, President
Barack Obama was expected to sign the legislation into law.

H.R.5771 provides a one-year extension through the end of
2014 for dozens of tax provisions that expired at the end of 2013, including
the wind energy production tax credit (PTC).

The one-year retroactive extension was far less than the
time frame sought by the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA), which was
advocating for a two-year PTC extension as contained in the EXPIRE Act – a
separate tax extenders package that passed in the Senate Finance Committee but
stalled in May.

However, faced with the prospect of resolving several issues
with must-pass status – namely, approving a spending bill to keep the U.S.
government operating – Congress simply ran out of time to deliberate
industry-specific issues in the truncated lame-duck session.

Ultimately, H.R.5771 contained enough provisions to appease
a broad range of stakeholders, including President Obama, who had threatened to
veto any legislation that favored corporations over low-income families.

As for the U.S. wind industry, however, few are expected to
benefit from the PTC’s extension.

“Unfortunately, the extension to the end of 2014 will only
allow minimal new wind development, and it will have expired again by the time
the new Congress convenes,” said Tom Kiernan, CEO of AWEA, shortly after the
Senate decision.

“Unfortunately, the extension to the end of 2014 will only
allow minimal new wind development, and it will have expired again by the time
the new Congress convenes,” said Tom Kiernan, CEO of AWEA, shortly after the
Senate decision.

Because H.R.5771 gave wind developers only a matter of weeks
left at the end of 2014 to start construction on a project in order to qualify
for the renewed PTC, many wind advocates framed the extension in real terms,
characterizing it as meaningless.

For example, shortly after the House passed H.R.5771 in
early December, Michael Goggin, AWEA’s director of research, posted a blog
titled, “Keeping Score: Why Is A Three-Week PTC Extension Worthless?”

In it, Goggin wrote, “No matter how you cut the math, or how
hard you work, it is just not possible to cram the 20+ weeks of work necessary
to start wind project construction into the three weeks